Back on Fox, Palin attacks CBS

Sarah Palin returned to Fox News on Monday with an hour-long guest appearance on “Fox & Friends” — just five months after leaving the network — and blasted a CBS journalist as putting the “BS in CBS” for using a tea party comparison in a report this weekend on the Iranian election.

On Palin’s first day back at Fox as a contributor, the former Republican vice presidential candidate discussed Edward Snowden, Benghazi, media bias and traveling in RVs, and also conducted interviews with Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and the captains of Discovery Channel’s “Deadliest Catch.” Sitting down with the hosts of “Fox & Friends” on Monday morning in New York City, Palin said it was good to be back on the network.

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“I get to be here the entire hour, good, bad or ugly, I will be here, thank you,” Palin said after the hosts welcomed her back to the network.

Fox News announced last week that Palin would rejoin the network just five months after she “ parted ways” with Fox after a three-year run. Palin first joined Fox News in 2009, after she resigned as Alaska governor. The former Republican vice presidential candidate will appear on Fox News’ daytime and primetime programming, and she will also be a contributor to Fox Business Network.

On Monday, the former Alaska governor slammed CBS’ Elizabeth Palmer, who reported on the Iranian election this weekend and sparked controversy in conservative circles by saying “in U.S. terms it was as if all the candidates for the presidency came from the tea party,” as representative of the “out of touch,” “lamestream” media.

“Okay, Elizabeth, you just put the BS in CBS,” Palin said. “It’s things like that that people hear and see and realize how out of touch the lamestream, the mainstream media is. To compare, really, the Iranian revolutionaries with those who are patriots in America and just want government to live within its Constitution?”

As the hosts and Palin broke down the various scandals that have hit Washington since she left Fox News, the former Alaska governor said she was most concerned about the “whole ball of wax that all leads to the revelation that government lies, unfortunately.”

“And with Benghazi, though, government lied and people died, so that’s very, very significant,” she said. “The other issues are government lied, and government spied. That’s pretty bad, too. But the Benghazi issue where brave, innocent Americans lost their lives in defense of our country, our freedoms, is quite significant because we still don’t have truth in regards to what happened there.”

And with the NSA leaks, the focus should be on how the Obama administration is intruding into people’s lives, not on Snowden, Palin said.

“I really don’t think that Snowden is the issue, though, in any of this,” Palin said. “I think that the issue again is that government is so large and so intrusive in all aspects of life that we need more revelations, we need more truth about what our administration is doing so that we can hold our government, that works for us, to hold them accountable.”

During her hour on the “Fox & Friends” so-called “curvy couch,” Palin also knocked New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg for what she described as his “nanny”-like approach to governing, particularly in light of the news he is planning to require New Yorkers to separate their food scraps for composting.

“Do New Yorkers feel like you’re just a bunch of little babies, with thank goodness you got this nanny over you telling you what to do everyday, heaven forbid otherwise you couldn’t get through your day?” she said.

But, she added, maybe this plan will keep him away from the “bigger issues” like gun control.

“I just think that your mayor, bless his heart, I’m sure well-intentioned, but I feel for New Yorkers who don’t have that liberty, that freedom to live as you deem most appropriate and safest and best for yourselves and families,” Palin said.

As for her departure from the network earlier this year to the news last week that she’d be back on air, Palin said she “didn’t go far, just up there in Alaska. And now I’m here.”

“I am doing great, very busy of course with my kids, two beautiful grandkids,” she said. “Writing a book, a book about Christmas, and pushing back on the politically correct who would try to take Christ out of Christmas. We talk a lot about that in the book, a kind of legalese about how to push back and protect the heart of Christmas, at the same time, a very festive and happy and jolly book about tradition, and recipes and fun things about Christmas.”